Project Alice
by tamagin
Summary: "And down he fell into the rabbit hole, never once considering how he was to ever get out." An AU in which Kagami meets the enigmatic Kuroko and falls into delirium with him. Or a modern take on Alice in Wonderland with psychological themes, a shoddy attempt at an elegiac redamancy, and that banal trope of conspiracy that comes with every sci-fi movie; whichever fits the foot best.
1. Prologue

Author's Note:

I apologize now if my writing... sucks. This is the first story I've written in years that I actually consider to be "good." I've been meaning to write an AU fic where the KnB characters were involved in the Alice in Wonderland world, and primarily made it a humor-filled fic, but since I'm more experienced in the genre of angst and butt-hurt, I decided to trash it and go with something more suited to my style ^-^

Expect lots of trippy shit, but nothing "too" trippy, because I'm not very creative; that's not me being modest!~ Shout out to my buddy, Liv. She helped me a lot, and helped me evolve the concept.

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**P**r_o_je**c**t _A_**l**ic**e**

**PROLOGUE**

Back when I was a pretentious scholar with basketball on the brain, my father sat me down at the mahogany kitchen table in the dining room, and told me, "Son, if you don't have the time to read, you don't have the time to dream."

His maxim hadn't resonated within me quite as well as he had hoped, but I kept it close to my heart. I understood that he meant a great deal with those words alone, but my contentious childhood didn't have enough experience with proverbs to be able to process them and learn from them.

It was when I lost the championship and my paternal guidance to the world I knew not of, that I pulled the bookmark from my perceptual chronicle and mulled his words over again. It forced me to humble myself and pick up a book from his dusty study, and from there, I was enamored with prospects of the narrative persuasion. I had this romantic notion that I would succeed in the literary world, albeit my less than adequate experience.

But what did it take to write a story- a great one? Stories are expected to have a beginning, middle, and an end, involving one, or maybe a few more characters with some twists and events to fill out the crevices. It can begin at any point of a character's life- an impasse or an in media res; a neutral standpoint or a riotous mayhem. Either way, the story will end.

The end of my story is hovering on the horizon, quivering in its recreant descent. The metaphorical blades are pointed directly at our throats, at my throat, but it's not fear for myself that staples my arid lips together.

The Emperor, with his peremptory gaze, appraises me for the nth time, convinced again, that beyond a doubt, he detests my existence, and therefore seeks to make a grandiose spectacle of my execution. He gestures to the prosecutor, a charmingly delicate swipe of his hand, and the prosecutor gives a curt nod.

I realize with a dreadful shudder down my spine that I'm not sane enough, nor strong enough, to remain at this podium; to watch as another person in my pitiable life is cut off from me. I strain against my binds, despite the continual blaring in my mind that the effort is meaningless, and am no less closer to the target at hand.

"Kagami Taiga- I repeat the question. Are you affiliated with the organization known as Seirin?" he asks with strictness, a push of his dainty finger against the bridge of his glasses.

I give no answer, and it's not because I can't, and more because I won't.

Back at the surface, the sky is a vast entity that seems to go on forever, but there's nothing to see. Down here, my blind eyes see a lot more. It has evolved me beyond the person I was, but at the same time, it has failed to change me much at all. It didn't subtract my pretentiousness or gullibility, but it does promise the augmentation of evident change. But right now, I don't want it.

"Kagami Taiga!"

The prosecutor slams a fist on my podium, disrupting any and all thoughts. He levels me with his acute gaze, but I don't let any involuntary flinch slip past me. Not with our lives on the line.

I suppose it's time for me to tell my story, and just as stories will always have that inevitable ending, I guess this will become mine. Likewise, it will also have a beginning. Though I warn you- it won't be what you'll expect.

It's just not that type of story.


	2. Chapter 1: Invigorating Vanilla

Author's Note:

Before I began this journey of topsy-turvy homoerotica, I had no idea where the setting would be, either in Japan or in America. To this day, I STILL don't have a clue, but my mind highly desires for it to be in America because it's what I'm most used to, and if I'm familiar with the customs, I'll be more able to deliver the story. But, I will still keep some of the characters' idiosyncrasies, even if it IS in America, because it just wouldn't be Kuroko without him adding -kun at the end, or Kise without him adding -cchi.

I will also warn you now that many of these characters will be verrrry OOC. This I promise. BUT, as all fanfic writers tend to do, they will TRY to keep them IC, and that is something I will also promise, so don't fret!~ A reminder that these characters are going to be influenced by the choices they made in the past in the premise of THIS story, not KnB, so they will not be the basketball-obsessed teens we know and love, but young adults who are bibliophiles, so I find it inconsequential if they aren't completely IC, but at least partially so! I hope you guys will forgive me for the shit-storm, hahahaha! v.v

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**P**r_o_je**c**t _A_**l**ic**e**

Chapter 1: _Invigorating Vanilla_

I was a university student with adequate but palatable marks who worked an abnormal schedule between a febrific newspaper columnist and weary waiter at a lackluster diner, with roller skates as its only form of captivation- for the waiters, not the customers. I picked the place for its weary disposition and less-than-meager customers for the welfare of my sleep, but the overly-gaudy, suburban décor always made me a tiny bit queasy. I'd usually hoof it to the diner from the dorms seven in the morning, enduring the whispers of winter, the suffocation of bundles of scarves, and slippery sidewalks, as that's what's in my daily agenda, but to get anywhere near the preamble of my story, I'll have to spare you the obligatory semantics of a protagonist in his niche.

The genesis of my spiral into hysteria is the third night I've called in sick for work because of a mishap in unreliable technology. Because of that, I had to spend a few nights in the newspaper club to write a similar article about the cultural arts we had in the college. That is- The Dwindling Forms of Self-expression due to Dwindling Forms of Encouragement. It wasn't usually something I wrote about, but Nijimura put me up to the task, so I had no reason to refuse.

Nijimura's the spartan but simple editor-in-chief of our quaint newspaper club, and his father is the dean of the university, but no one particularly cares for the fact because he's solicitous when the situation calls for it. Besides, he wasn't riding coattails to establish his bona fides. He had also been the one who lured me into the club, and even if I hadn't agreed, it was irrevocable because we had the same seminars anyway. It was at the same time that I decided I needed to polish my skills as a writer, and I found it an auspicious opportunity.

I owed a lot to Nijimura for his liberal teachings, and admired him the most, being three years my senior. He and I also had an array of similar interests, namely basketball, so it was always a sense of comfort to speak to him. I've always thought about being a closer friend, someone he could confide in, but it wasn't something I'd bend over backwards for, so I didn't make it a personal ambition. He isn't the sentimental type, anyway.

"Okay, who took the creamer again?"

I looked around. Over at the coffee dispenser, with steaming coffee in a faulty styrofoam cup, Ryuhei, the managing editor, was scratching at his head and questioning the existence of yet another coffee mate.

Ryuhei has been in the newspaper club the longest, but he's never complained about Nijimura taking the spotlight, which led many of us to believe that he was virtuous in nature- which is indeed true, although at midnight, that isn't the case. He reverts into something we refer to as "supercilious" and "despotic," but as Tomoki, his brother-in-law, once put it, Ryuhei was an "overbearing bitch- alliteration to hit the nail on the head." Many of us snickered around the water cooler, but that was short-lived because Tomoki, as we all seemed to forget, is a person who has little to no tact when it comes to "keeping it on the down low." After an awkward confrontation, we soon realized that coffee was the tamer and seductress of Ryuhei's imperious tendencies, coercing us to all chip in and buy a coffee dispenser for the club, albeit begrudgingly.

"Tomoki, did you take it?" Ryuhei pointed an accusatory finger at Tomoki's shaven head, currently bopping to the beat of ear-shredding music at mass volume. I sighed, yanking one of his ear buds so that it fell to his left shoulder. Tomoki, seemingly vexed, cocked his head in ignorance, which invited Ryuhei to sigh for the nth time, fingers tapping on the counter in impatience. Fortunately, he's affable enough to gratingly repeat the question.

There was something pathetic in Tomoki's concentration as he brought himself back to the corporeal plane, a result of insomnia, no doubt, but his words came out with a sort of buoyancy, like his wonted self in waking hours. "Nope! I hate vanilla, so there'd be no point if I took it!" Despite his air-headed tendencies, Tomoki made astute arguments. No one anticipated that he would become the opinion editor, or be remotely good at writing at all, so it had definitely been something to write home about. To this day, it still makes me scratch at my head, although it'd be hypocrisy in my case.

"Did you check the cabinets?"

"Of course I checked the shitty cabinets."

"Then how about the fridge?"

"Yes, that too, you oedipal sicko."

"Hey! That was one time, and it was my step-mother."

"You disgust me."

"Whatever. She was already filing the divorce and we were three sheets to the wind, so choke on sugar." Tomoki flipped him a petulant bird, sipping on the tepid coffee he poured himself three hours ago, to add salt to the wound. It smelled faintly of hazel-nut.

Everyone knew of Tomoki's exceptional licentiousness, so no one particularly batted an eyelash. Besides, that affair with his step-mother was last year, and it was stomped out like a cigarette butt because Tomoki wasn't even remotely offended by the gossip. With nothing to fan the flames, it was quickly made latent history and stashed in the back of everyone's subconscious library.

"Just use milk, for now. Isn't that fine?" Shinya charitably suggested, the effortless abuse of his keyboard undeterred, even with the intermittent pushes to his glasses. He's the level-headed news editor with multitasking skills that are rivaled by none. Ryuhei's a close friend of his- a childhood friend of sorts, apparently, though Ryuhei has no recollection of it whatsoever. Still, their camaraderie worked. When Ryuhei vetoed his idea, that milk only stained the coffee a sickly beige, and added nothing to its native taste, Shinya rested his case and that was that.

Everyone went back to work while Ryuhei lurched another cabinet open, the one he'd thoroughly checked five times, and continues the same treatment to the other cabinets, almost in a neurotic frenzy. After a few minutes have passed, he groans, and the resounding smack of the fridge jolts everyone awake from their momentary stupors. "Damn. I put the thing on the counter last night so I wouldn't forget..." he began to mutter, making grandiose gestures with his hands to play out the mini theater in his mind. "Where's that damn intern Nijimura mentioned?"

"What did I mention?"

I was on my way to finishing the last segment when Nijimura's voice called the attention of many of us. Even if it hadn't been him to enter through that decrepit door, I found it a necessity of curiosity to always look at whomever decided to grace us with their presence at the wee hours of the night. With himself he brought four noisy plastic bags, two in each hand, which are then graciously deposited on the counter. The previous whimpers of Ryuhei's are drowned and forgotten with the excited squeals of rolling chairs and cessation of typing as everyone crowds around the counter and eyes for their microwavable meal.

"Oi, Kagami, your burgers!" Nijimura beckoned my attention, promptly throwing me five wrapped hamburgers. I caught them all clumsily, caught off-guard by the sudden assault. "They only had five left, so I couldn't get the usual ten."

"Nah, it's cool. Thanks." After unwrapping one of the burgers, I stashed it into my mouth to show how appreciative I was. He got the hint, and went on distributing the rest of the pile.

"Nijimura! Did you get some vanilla creamer, by chance?" Ryuhei asked in an almost self-induced panic, peering above his shoulder.

Nijimura raised an eyebrow. "It's gone again?"

"Yup!" Tomoki inputted, voice muffled by the excessive food in his mouth. "Ryuhei's having another mid-life crisis because of it."

"Why didn't you just text me before I left the store?" Nijimura ran a hand through his inky hair with exasperation, while Ryuhei went on to say that he sent a million text messages, none of which were replied to.

Their conversation quickly became white noise to me, a soft reminder that they were still talking, but were otherwise no longer a distraction. It kept me rooted to my work, despite my dwindling interest in the "dwindling arts." Much like everyone else's inaudible chatter, the words in front of me became imperceptible and even I was unable to decipher what the hell I was writing. I attributed it to the fact that I hadn't had sleep for a while, that the stressful environment was making me less of a functioning human being and more of a desensitized zombie, but hey, it was the mundane college life, and you couldn't expect more out of something so pedestrian. "You misspelled renaissance with reconnaissance." I rubbed at my worn eyes, murdering the urge to slap my face like a child, or else be disrupted by the sight of the premature moon, and write nonsensical bullshit and call it post-modernism.

"Also, impressionism and expressionism are different."

My eyes focused on him, but my brain wasn't quick enough to process his corporeal eventuation, that someone had been suspiciously hovering over my shoulder and watching me type idiotically. I jolted, despite myself, garnering the unrequested eyes of my colleagues. Maybe I also shrieked effeminately, if their conspiratorial smirks were anything to go by.

The queer, paranormal-esque entry of this occult individual baffled me, but he doesn't leave me room to investigate more before he snags a neighboring chair from a vacant desk and settles into it to ogle my convoluted work. He pointed at the screen.

"Reconnaissance. Replace that with renaissance." He chanced a glimpse at me through the corners of his eyes, and they reminded me of a cloudless sky in a breezy midsummer, energetic and rousing, but also electric and ardent, redolent of lightning in a summer storm. He had this almost crazy allure, in a more metaphysical sense, that crooked its finger in a come-hither motion, and clasped your attention in place. This showed more in the way he talked, a sort of lilt that was difficult to forget but even harder to remember, so that with each word, you're inclined to follow every inflection, or else miss an intonation and dub the memory nonexistent. For lack of better wording, it was a low, thrilling hum, his voice. It gave me a pleasant tingle in my stomach to hear the illusion in his monotone that hid the promises of passionate things.

"You look confused. Would you like me to explain the difference again?" he politely asked.

A barking laughter shocked me from my evident daze. "Ah, Kuroko. Don't mind Kagami. He's probably off to la-la land again." Tomoki prodded at my cheek, which I then proceeded to smack away.

"Shut up, will ya? I'm just tired." I rubbed at my eyes again to further dismiss the notion that I was anywhere near daydreaming. "And you-," I glared for max effect. "Who the hell are you and why are you butting into my business?" He blinked at me for a time, and the longer he stared, the more hot the room seemed to be getting.

"This is the intern I was talking about, Kuroko Tetsuya. He's been helping us out for a while now, but I never got around to introducing him till today," Nijimura supplied, ruffling Kuroko's blue hair and making a huge mess of it. Kuroko didn't look too pleased by the end of it.

"Nice to meet you, Kagami Taiga. I've read lots of your columns." He lent his hand out to shake, and I eyed it with reservation. I waited for him to go on about what he thought of my works, but he made no sign of doing anything else but awaiting my reciprocation. For good graces, I shook his hand. It was as soft as a woman's, like I initially thought, but it lacked warmth.

Nijimura looked at the clock on the wall, eyes dawning with realization, as he put a gloved hand on Kuroko's shoulder. Kuroko cocked his head in curiosity, but made no move to release my hand. "Ah, the copier's gonna open soon. Let me you show you the ropes, and then after that, you can help Narumi proof-read the segments." Kuroko nodded solemnly, following after Nijimura with haste before he skids to a stop, and turns around. He cups a hand around his mouth, and waves me closer.

I bend down to accommodate his height, and his voice wafts into my ear. "You still haven't changed reconnaissance into renaissance."

The grab at his hair in a jovial manner was almost instinctive, but he doesn't comment on it. "I got it, already!"

Kuroko smiled, and then he races after Nijimura. After that, I bullshitted the rest of the segment like I thought I would, because the only thought I had in my mind was the smell of brewed coffee and vanilla on his breath.


End file.
